


Princely rebellion

by starhugger



Category: Clockhand Children Universe - Fandom
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Rebellion, Rogue Jesse AU, also smut plenty of that, who wouldnt want to make out in a tree
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-08
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-28 09:14:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16238615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starhugger/pseuds/starhugger
Summary: AU Where Jesse rebelled with Abel.





	Princely rebellion

**Author's Note:**

> Hope y'all like smut

I remember waking up that night, in the darkness of my room. Artificial moonlight and stars prickled my vision as I sleepily blinked and sat myself up. I hadn’t bothered sleeping with a blanket or pillow, having fallen asleep on the floor. I had no bed- I wasn’t really one to  _sleep._

I knew, surely, a sound must have woken me up. Sure enough, I heard something a few moments later. The sound of a window opening, and somebody having hopped out to the ground below.

Clockhands shouldn't be out this late.

I swiftly threw on my coat and walked down the steps, exiting my room and breathing in the air with a sigh.

I looked around. I saw nothing at first except what I expected to be there- buildings, sidewalks, and— A figure.

“Who’s there?” I asked, pulling my dagger out from inside my coat. They didn’t answer, turning the corner and disappearing.

Angrily, I followed, as quiet as I could. Watching the figure, I stalked them from behind until a snap made them notice I was there.

Instead of seeing a fearful clockhand break into a sprint, I saw bright green eyes turn back at me. Neon green, almost artificial.

“ _Abel?”_ I asked, extremely confused by the presence of the council member now in front of me. I then realized I had potentially disrespected him, and was immediately on my knees, bowing down submissively.

“Um.” Abel whispered. “It’s fine, Jesse. Get up- please.”

Surprised, I stood myself back up and watched as Abel pulled me very close.

“Listen to me.” Abel said in a hushed voice. “You need to be very, very quiet.”

“Why?” I muttered back. “What’s going on? Are we in danger?”

Abel’s face turned solemn very quickly, and I realized that I was about to hear something I didn’t like at all.

“I’m leaving.” Abel said, his jaw clamping.

I stood there, transfixed. “Leaving… the building…?”

“Leaving everything.” He replied. I now realized his makeup was streaming down his face, and his hair was undone and sticking out instead of neatly slicked back. His clothes were no longer his suit, but instead a plain white shirt and some jeans. Nobody would ever recognize him as Abel except me.

“Everything?” I exclaimed, to which Abel had to shush me. “W-what are you  _saying?_ Where will you  _go?_ Wh-”

Abel covered my mouth. I stared at his piercing green eyes, and his messy hair, and… everything else. I didn’t know what to say. So I let him speak.

“Jesse, I have been in this Council for thousands of years. They have told me things, and they have shared with me how they keep this place running. They hurt people. They hurt  _you._ And at one point, I realized I couldn’t do it anymore. This isn’t how we should be governed. This is slavery.”

Abel breathed in, very slowly, before breaking the news to me.

“I’m becoming rogue, Jesse. I’m changing my name and everything else and I’m switching sides. I can’t do this anymore. I’m done hurting people.”

I couldn’t respond. My first thought immediately went to how quickly he would be killed- by doing this, he would die. I think he knew this, but I couldn’t process everything he was saying regardless. Was he dumb? Was he high? Suicidal? I never realized how much this had been on his mind until now.

“Abel.” I choked out, tears starting to form in my eyes despite my better judgement. “T-they’ll kill you. You. You can’t  _leave,_ Abel-”

I was crying into his shoulder then, for what I thought must be the very last time. He held me, despite both of us knowing he had little time to get out of here and begin everything he had to do. He was warm. I gripped so tightly my knuckles went white. I couldn’t breathe- everything was going dark.  
  
”Jesse.” Abel murmured, but I couldn’t respond. It felt like choking on sand.

“I don’t want to kill you!” I finally yelled out, and despite us both having known when this conversation started, hearing it being said out loud made us both stare at each other for a very, very long time, probably horrified at the realization that I killed rogue clockhands for the council in every single case. Abel was much too calm for me to bear in this situation. Did he even care about what this meant?

He took both hands into his own and put them to his chest as he looked at me. I felt my heartbeat pick up as my eyes went a little wide.

“You could come with.” He whispered, his eyes softening immediately.

Silence was my only response as I stared at him, wide-eyed and unable to speak for a moment.

“Y-you want me to… go… with you? And… be rogue and fight the council and possibly die with you?” I asked, softly. Abel nodded.

“We could build something great together.”

I pondered on this. There was no middle ground. I either go or I don’t. He either dies or we both die. Or, maybe we’d both live, but I wasn’t one to be optimistic when my crush, who happened to be a fucking _council member,_ had me cornered and was speaking about running away with me to start a revolution against the people I’ve server my entire life. And yet…

“They use you. Surely you know that?” He asked.

Setting my jaw tightly, I nodded and forced myself to admit he was right.

“Of course they do.”

“Then come with me!” Abel exclaimed. “You could be so much more than—  _This.”_

“I know.” I whispered. “But what would happen to us in the end? You make this sound so easy…”

“I don’t know. What I do know, however, is that I’d rather die than live to hurt people anymore.”

That was when the shouting began. Abel looked up, fearful, before briefly gripping my hands.

“Come on.” He whispered, begging me. “Come with me.”

“I can’t.” I stammered out. “T-they’ll find me. They can track me and they’ll find you too.”

Abel looked at me for a very long time, realizing I was right. Abel was a council member, even if he was rebelling against it. They never put him on radar- but they did for me. Me coming with him could put everything he’s trying to achieve in danger.

Yet, as the voices got closer, we both found ourselves running in the same direction. Our feet pounded on the newly placed concrete as we ran straight out of the city into the lesser known areas. Winding, spiral-like trees sprawled out around the grey shades of grass that probably weren’t biological in the first place. I assumed the Council placed it there so it could look _pretty_ or something. We found ourselves hiding in a very small area inside a tree someone must have hollowed out. Or maybe the trees were fake and hollow too. I was unsure.

We were hugging and gripping each other so fearfully I thought we could have been found by the sound of our hearts beating. I knew I was sobbing, and he was teary eyed too. He was beginning to realize just how severe this was going to get, I think. That even though he came from royalty, they would kill him as they killed anyone else. Especially his brother, Cain. The fact that their names came from the biblical tale involving fratricide probably wasn’t calming his nerves. And yet, he was smiling- almost laughing.

He opened up his arms and spread his legs out so I could prop up against his chest, still trembling. I was seriously doing this. I was following a rogue council member to god knows where. And I was scared.

But it was unbelievably exciting. To feel no limits in my lungs made me feel like I could breathe fire and destroy a planet. I thought, for a while, I could do anything now.

They could track me, unless maybe I found where they put the tracker in the first place. Trackers were rather small objects, placed somewhere within your body. Nobody knows how they got there, but they existed unless you were out in the real world with a host.

As I began to press into my temples, a common spot, and my neck, Abel muttered to me, “They put it in your wrist.”

I had forgotten that he knew these things…

I looked at them both closely, and sure enough, I could feel a small bump on my left wrist. It must be the tracker, because I could feel tiny little beeps come from it. They were using it.

Slowly pulling my dagger back out, I had to carefully put a small slit in my wrist. Pressing the edges of the bump, the bloodied disk came out. It beeped a small bit, and I was about to crush it. Abel told me not to, however, and I instead threw it as hard as I could into the wilderness. He told me crushing it would cause an alarm.

“There you go.” Abel murmured softly, running a hand through my hair. I felt a little odd, my stomach feeling fuzzy knowing a council member was treating me like a lap dog. He probably didn’t realize how much his “friendly notions” made my head spin. Having a crush on him was forbidden, so I had it repressed for a very long time, but right now… He almost seemed to be encouraging it. And I liked it.

When we finally felt the yelling die out, the crowd clearly having found my tracker but not the Jesse they were looking for, they left the forests and continued looking into the city. They must have assumed we ran back after throwing the disk here. Abel ran his hands through his hair and put it into a much looser style as he took my dagger and cut his jeans into shorts. He then held me close as he cut the sleeves off my (very expensive) coat and began remaking it with a sewing needle. When he returned it back, it looked much more like a vest. He cut my undershirt into a teeshirt before sliding the vest over it. He then undid my hair and made it into a braid as I took my glasses off.

“Cassandra is a rogue.” Abel breathed out. “She sells contact lenses to rogues like us.”

_Like us._

My breath hitched almost immediately. Abel knew why, but he didn’t comment on it. He was clearly planning on this. I hadn’t been.

“Well…” I whispered. “If I’m one of you guys now… And there’s… uh… no limit to what we can do…”

I turned to him, and his eyes glimmered as he peered at me. I think he knew what I was thinking, given the way he was looking at me. How did he know? Could he read my mind? Did he _know?_

I came to get very close to his face, breathing very little, as if breathing too much could make him dissipate. I looked for a sign that he wanted me to stop, but none came. He only smiled.

_He had known all this fucking time._

My eyes stared into his, before panning down a little and looking at his lips. Then back to his eyes.

“I. Um. Can I?” I asked, slowly turning red as my lower lip twitched nervously.

Abel only laughed at me. I didn’t know if that was a yes or no.

Well actually, I got my answer, because two seconds later we were kissing.

It was shorter than I would have liked, to be fair, but I still felt like everything in my body exploded like a supernova. And not in a bad way. I could feel chapstick on his lips as they pressed into mine, and I shakily grabbed his hand. Dizziness overcame me, and I trembled harder than before, but I felt like I couldn’t get enough. For a few moments, time seemed to pause as he pushed me up against the side, his hands gripping my shoulders as he started to literally _make out with me._

Were we french kissing? I didn’t really know. I think we were french kissing. We might have even been sliding our hands under each others shirts or some other act I would have never imagined doing with Abel. I didn’t expect to even get a hug from him, let alone a long, sensual make out session, with me now on the bottom of a hollow tree and him basically on top of me.

He started to grind into my lap, and I don’t know why it felt so good, but it did. He told me later on that I was apparently moaning a lot. I had expected myself to clam up at the realization that this was extremely sexual and that I wasn’t allowed to do this, but I was moving back up against him too, my hands letting go of his and instead pulling him close by wrapping my hands around his shoulders. Clockhand Children weren’t really allowed to do this, but considering we were rogues anyways, we might as fucking well get something substantial in there. It felt natural and not terrifying at all anymore.

I have to admit, it was a lot better to kiss him now, when his hair wasn’t slicked back with grease.

We might have been making a lot of noise, but did we care? Of fucking course not. Maybe this whole rogue thing would be benifical if I got to make out with Abel in trees about 100% more than before.

I was kind of sad when he pulled back, but we were both burning up. Had he wanted to do that before? I had. I think.

“You’re really fucking hot.” I blurted out, still laying there, completely dazed, and Abel burst into laughter.

My lips started to buzz oddly. I pressed a finger to them, and I could see Abel smile. “Buzzing chapstick.”

I smiled. Definitely sounds like something he’d put on.

“Can we do that again?” I asked foggily. Abel smiled down at me. “What more could we do?”

“You know what.” I snapped, glaring at him as he giggled.

“Might as fucking well.” Abel murmured, crawling back on me. I seemed to immediately sink back down and let Abel pin me down. He nudged my head to the side, starting to suck at an area on my neck, grinding _hard._ I whimpered, my hands balling up instinctively.

“You know, I never thought you’d be a bottom.” Abel said. I have no idea what that meant.

I know I was breathing really heavily, but that was okay. Everything about this was okay. I don’t think I’ve ever been so willing to let something happen in my entire existence.

At some point, Abel had gotten us both out of our clothes and completely into it, ramming into me. It’s a blur to me now, except how good it felt. I was really cold at the upper half of my body, to be completely honest, but Abel was the warmest thing I had ever put my body to before, so it was okay. It wasn’t like I could focus on anything besides the fact that a council member was fucking me, anyways. Everything in my body must have been feeling amazing, watching Abel move into me as he sweated. I wonder if he’s ever done this before— I hadn’t. I was basically limp for most of it, my arms above my head and my eyes lightly closed as I yelled and moaned.

A surge came through me eventually, and I felt like my whole body had been flipped on. I was told that I was loud. To the point where Abel covered my mouth. And then it was over.

I was barely even awake, still limp, and now shivering now that Abel was mostly off of me. After he had put his clothes back on, I felt him do the same for me. I hazily muttered a thank you. A few moments later, we were back to snuggling for what felt like forever. I might have even fallen asleep.

“We’d- We’d uh. Better find Cassandra.” Abel murmured to me, eventually, and I nodded. Crawling out of the hollowed tree, we began to head back into the city as stealthily as possible.

“We’re gonna have to like. Pick out new names.” Abel said to me. I blinked. I could never really pick a name besides Jesse on my own. It was all I ever knew. For god’s sake, I was still processing the fact that I just rebelled against everything I’d ever known and had sex with a runaway council member in a hollowed out tree.

Abel clearly knew where he was going, and I followed him, holding his hand nervously. By the time we reached the small shop, the ‘sun’ was starting to rise.

When we entered, the red haired clockhand I assumed was Cassandra looked at us intently.

“Abel and Jesse?” She said, smiling, but it was clearly nervous.

Abel came close to her. I don’t really understand what he did, but he made some kind of motion with his hands.

Cassandras mouth immediately dropped like an anchor.

“ _You two?”_ She asked, her eyes the size of baseball bats. We both nodded.

She breathed in, very slowly, before exhaling, taking this in. Sort of like what I was still doing.

She then bent down, grabbing something out of a cabinet below her, before showing us the case. Opening it, many different colors of eye contacts were inside.

Abel peered at them all as I watched for a bit. I quite liked the brown ones— but that was boring…

Abel ended up picking a dark shade of green so they weren’t too different, and while I ended up taking a bit longer, I ended up picking yellow.

“Yellow?” Abel asked. “They’re gonna think you’re a chime.”

“I know.” I said, putting them in and peeking at the mirror behind Cassandra.

They shined brilliantly. I quite liked them.

“How much are they?” Abel asked.

“12 bits each.” She said. I pulled out the silvery coins and handed them over. As if i’d make the council member pay.

“Thanks.” She said.

Then she pulled us both close by the collars of our shirts.

“Do not fuck this up.” She hissed. “Be careful.”

She then let us go and gave us bags with a few plain outfits in them that we could wear. I also saw a very small bottle of what Abel said was hair dye.

“Where do we go?” I asked. Abel thought for a moment. “Aurora’s old house keeps tons of rogues in there. We could take refuge until we find our own place.”

“We’re… Gonna meet  _more of them?”_ I asked fearfully.

“Jes.” Abel said, smiling at me. “You’re one of them. You don’t have anything to be afraid of.”

“I guess you’re right…” I murmured, and I felt a small squeeze at my hand. My anxiety lifted a little.

“I just didn’t plan this.” I said, my voice sounding mildly amused as I managed to smile nervously.

“Isn’t that exciting?” Abel asked me.

“Yes.”

We came to reach the old house Aurora lived in, and we knocked, very quietly. An irritated, battered looking face peered out, purple eyed.

“What do you two want?” They hissed.

They then looked at us closer. “Oh Jesus…”

They opened the door fully, looking both ways before pulling us both in and slamming the door, locking it about 5 times over.

Many injured and worried clockhands sat at the walls. Some played cards. Some were talking in hushed whispers. They all looked at us, and began whispering fervently.

“Is that Jesse and Abel?” One asked.

“I think so.” Replied another.

“Aurora will want to hear about this.” Said the purple eyed clock, disappearing into another room. We felt eyes all over us, so we sat in the corner where nobody could bother us.

Except, plenty tried anyways.

“Why the hell are  _you two_ here?” One asked aggressively.

“Yeah man, trying to rat us out?” Another caterwauled.

“No.” Abel replied. “We rebelled too.”

“As if!” Said the first, beginning to stand up for some kind of confrontation. I stood, too, getting angry as my eyes flashed.

“Stop.” Said a calm, yet mature voice.

We all stopped and looked over. Aurora, I assume, stood with the purple clockhand.

Her hair was a very light, curly brown, her eyes teal and with many freckles speckling her face.

She looked us over.

“I see you two have had a night.” She said, her eyebrows raising. “You both actually defected?”

“Of course they didn’t! They’re here to k-”

“I wasn’t speaking to you, Kevin.” Aurora interrupted, flashing a glance.

“Um..” I said, nervously. “Yes. We both… ran away and had to hide in the forest before we got color contacts and came here.”

“And you two did this on the exact same night?” Aurora said, rightfully suspicious.

“We did this together.” Abel said, his eyes carefully narrowing, but not too much.

“Mmm…” Aurora said, clearly still thinking this over. Playful amusement flashed in her eyes when she saw us holding hands.

She breathed in very slowly. “You’re allowed to stay. I’ll speak with you both individually in a bit.”

Some of the rogues immediately began recoiling. Yells of disbelief and anger washed through the group, and I found myself nervously looking down.

“Silence!” Aurora said, turning fiery. “Do you forget why we started this? So clockhand children could be _equal!_ Anyone is allowed to join us, whether they be high rank or low rank. What is next, do you want to start banning gears? They’ve oppressed plenty of us.”

The crowd died down.

“Jesse has been used by the Council as well, even if he is above us. He’s been tortured and forced to kill people in our ranks, and what does he get for it? Another day to live, maybe! Jesse is what we consider the Council’s personal slave. Of course he’d want to defect. He has been treated awfully, as many of us have.” Aurora stated calmly.

“And Abel…”

She turned to him. “Abel was a good person to question his morality, despite the system benefiting him entirely. He chose the path of making us free instead of keeping him and his associates in power. If that doesn’t hold the energy of the revolution, then what is the revolution?”

Nods slowly rose as whispering arose again. Aurora had clearly convinced them.

She sighed. “As I said before… I will see you two alone in a few minutes.”

With a final flick, she slid back into the other room, like the flash of a flame burning in a candle.

Abel’s hand wrapped around my shoulder, and I leaned into his side quietly, letting us both relax and sit down. He rested his head on top of mine as I slowly sighed.

“That was a show.” Abel murmured. I nodded, quiet.

Abel seemed to stare off, thinking. “I like the name Ian. What do you think?” he asked, looking at me.

I blinked calmly. “I like it.”

“Good.” Ian said. “Ian it is.”

I smiled. “I think I’ll keep mine.”

“If you insist.”

I curled up into his chest, closing my eyes and letting him hold me as I became tired. Aurora was looking at us from her room, but she could tell we were about to pass out and left us alone, probably until tomorrow.

Slowly, I began to drift off until a gentle kiss on the forehead sent me off into my dreams. _Real_ dreams, that for once, maybe I could achieve.


End file.
